


Making it to First

by orphan_account



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-17
Updated: 2015-02-17
Packaged: 2018-03-13 12:03:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3380837
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Brienne/Sansa high school AU.  Brienne is the star pitcher for the girls' softball team, and Sansa is a cheerleader.  They both like each other, but need a little help from their devious best friends to make something happen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Making it to First

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mautadite](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mautadite/gifts).



Brienne’s eyes narrowed as she watched Asha’s signal: fastball, high and inside. She didn’t like it. Frey was too close to the plate. Asha wanted her to bean the chick. Brienne shook her head once. But Asha was insistent. Brienne nodded once, wound up, and then fired the 60 mile an hour fastball that she’d become known for in the county among the high school girls’ softball teams. It was pretty much expected that she’d get a full ride at any school she wanted if it had a women’s softball team.

It thudded into Asha’s glove, brushing Frey back from the plate and earning her a strike.

The girls on the cheering squad were hollering from behind the third base line. Brienne could tell from the look on the batter’s face that Asha was nonstop shit-talking her the entire time that they stood there waiting for the pitch.

One more, this time low and away. Frey swung. She missed. The inning was over.

They cleared the field and the cheering squad began to do an impressive routine that was probably a more condensed version of what they won with at championships. Asha slapped Brienne on the back. “Good job,” she said. “You didn’t even bean her.”

But Brienne was staring out behind the third base line, looking like she was somewhere far away.

Asha looked at her. “Hello? Tarth?”

She followed Brienne’s gaze to the delicate-looking, graceful redhead second from the left, in the second row of the pyramid of pretty girls doing acrobatics to Taylor Swift’s “Shake It Off”.

“Got your eye on that little ginger?” she inquired casually.

“Huh? What?” Brienne reddenned, wiping her palms on her uniform. “No, what are you talking about?”

Asha smirked. “OK, whatever.”

Asha always insisted to Brienne that she could get a lot of cute girls if she wanted; she kept telling her she had a cool, sort of butchy thing that could totally get her lots of action if she only had a little more confidence. Brienne never entirely believed her. “How come we got the cheering squad at this game anyway?” she asked, changing the subject. “That’s pretty weird. The girls’ softball team doesn’t usually rate the cheerleaders.”

Asha shrugged. “Oh, you know. The new cheer captain, Margaery. She’s all about boosting school spirit and stuff.”

Brienne looked skeptically at her. “Whatever.”

The Westeros Wildcats didn’t win their game that day, through no fault of Brienne’s: Dacey and Obara, their two best hitters, just weren’t supporting her with runs that day. She slunk back to her car, knowing she’d pitched as good a game as anyone could want from her, and that they’d live to fight another day and all that. It was still disappointing, though.

She spotted the pretty redhead, fumbling with a number of bags as well as the keys to her own car, parked a few spots down from Brienne’s.

“Hey,” Asha whispered. “It’s her. Go talk to her.”

“Shut up,” Brienne answered.

“Look, she’s struggling. Do that chivalry thing you do. Go help her out,” Asha persisted.

Brienne frowned at Asha, but now the redhead had noticed them drawing closer and was looking at Brienne as they walked closer. Asha broke off and leaned against Brienne’s beat-up Dodge, lighting a cigarette and staying out of the way.

Brienne approached. “Hey, uh… do you… need a hand or something?”

The redhead looked up, looking shy but momentarily relieved. “Oh, uh, no I think I’m okay.”

“Here, let me hold those bags for you so you can get your keys out.” Brienne took the big duffle off her hands while she retrieved the keys.

She pulled out her keys and unlocked the car, and got in, started it, and left Brienne standing there holding the bag while she drove about ten feet before realizing that she’d left her bag with Brienne. She stopped, and backed up.

“Sorry,” she apologized. “I’m an idiot.”

“It’s ok,” Brienne said. “Nobody’s perfect.” She immediately kicked herself for that answer. “I guess you, uh, want your bag.” She opened the back door and tossed it in.

The redhead smiled, and seemed like she was blushing. “Yeah, thanks… See you around…” And she drove away.

“Well?” Asha demanded.

“What?” Brienne replied grumpily.

“Did you get her number?”

Brienne shook her head.

Asha gave a disgusted sigh. “Well, what’s her name?”

Brienne shrugged.

“Christ, you’re hopeless.”

 

**

 

Asha had been fooling around with Margaery Tyrell for about a month. It had to be a secret, because Margaery wasn’t out, but Asha was willing to put up with that because the little brunette with the sparkly blue eyes and deep dimples was probably the hottest girl she’d gotten with. And it meant that they now they suddenly got the cheering squad at their softball games, which was pretty cool. They were making out in Margaery’s rec room, half-watching watching reruns of Agent Carter, when Asha suddenly remembered she had a mission.

“Oh, hey. Who’s that redhead on the cheering squad? The real pretty one? I think she might be new or something?”

Margaery smiled. “You mean Sansa Stark? Yeah, she’s not new, she’s just a wallflower. You probably never noticed her before. She’s taken a bunch of ballet and stuff, I had to practically drag her onto the team. Why? You getting tired of me?”

Asha snorted. “As if.” She kissed Margaery again. “I just… my friend likes her, but she’s a complete moron with girls.”

Margaery laughed. “Well, I hate to tell you, but Sansa’s not much better. Who’s your friend?”

“Our star pitcher, actually.”

Margaery grinned evilly. “No kidding. She couldn’t stop going on about how impressive she was in the last game.”

“You think she’s got a shot?”

“More than a shot. But this is going to take some doing because she’s a big dork. She’s literally the worst at picking up signals out of anyone I’ve met.”

“Hey,” Asha said, pulling the old yawn and stretch move, “for some people, it takes a village.  People think getting to home is the big deal, but a lot of times, the hardest part is getting to first.”

 

**

The softball team was going to have “team bonding night” at the Stark house. Arya played shortstop for the Wildcats and was absolutely insistent that they do it there, since they had the room. The Starks probably had the biggest place in town, with the exception of the Baratheon place, and nobody on the team wanted to do it there, including Myrcella Baratheon, who played third, because her mom tended to get a little… intense about the games.

So they’d do a screening of “A League of Their Own”, outside on the back lawn, projected on the back wall of the house. They’d have coolers full of soda and Robb would grill some burgers and it’d be a nice night. Margaery would bring some of the cheerleaders and a few illicit wine coolers that Mrs. Stark would pretend she didn’t see.

As the group was getting settled in, Asha spotted Sansa taking a burger from her brother and taking it over to the table to put condiments and stuff on it. She nudged Brienne. “Go get her a drink, stupid. Hurry up before she gets it herself.”

Brienne shambled over to the table. “Hey, uh...do you need something to drink?” She made the mistake of looking at Sansa’s hamburger and realized that she had slathered it with mustard, relish, ketchup, mayo and what looked like hot sauce. “Seems like you might want it with your burger done up like that.”

Once again, she kicked herself inside.

Sansa looked up at her, looking quizzical. “What’s wrong with my burger?”

“Uh, nothing, it’s just...a lot of stuff. I guess I’m just not as brave as you with my hamburgers.” Brienne shuffled uncomfortably. “Anyway, do you want a soda or something?”

Sansa smiled, looking a little embarrassed. “Um, no, thanks. I, uh, I don’t know what I want.”

She wandered away, and from the frustrated look on Brienne's face, she could see that Asha could tell how brilliantly that had gone. They were going to need a different level of intervention.

Somewhere during the "no crying in baseball" scene, Arya decided that they needed some more chips. "San," she called loudly, "can you go in and get some more chips?"

"Why do I have to get the chips?"

"Because I got them last time."

Sansa sighed and got up.

Asha nudged Brienne. "Go help her with the chips."

"She doesn't need help with carrying chips."

"Just go, or I'm never speaking to you again."

"You say that like it's a threat."  But Brienne followed Sansa into the house and downstairs into the pantry. "Hey, I just thought you might like some help."

Sansa jumped a little, but turned around looking pleased to see her. "Oh, hi. Um, I don't know if i need help, but you can help anyway, if you want."

The wind blew the door at the top the stairs shut. Sansa frowned. She handed Brienne a couple of economy size bags of Doritos and they walked up the steps. They reached the top, and Brienne tried the knob. "It's locked."

Sansa sighed. "Are you kidding me?"

Brienne shook her head. "Nope." She tried it again. She began to panic. What was she going to do? She was stuck down here and had better than 50/50 odds of making an idiot of herself in an enclosed space with a pretty girl.

They tried pounding and yelling but with the movie playing on the large sound system outside, it was unlikely anyone could hear them.

They sat down on the steps.

"Now what?"

Sansa shrugged. "I text everyone and hope one of them isn't too busy watching the movie to notice, I guess."

After texting everyone she could, they sat.

"Um, you were really amazing the other day," she said finally.

Brienne smiled shyly. "Thanks. Wasn't enough to win the game, though."

"Well, you can't do it alone. No I in team and all that."

Brienne smiled. "You're really good at that cheer stuff. It looks pretty hard."

"Eight years of ballet," Sansa sighed. "It helps."

Brienne was impressed. "That takes a lot of discipline. You must be strong."

"Probably not as strong as you, Ms. Sixty Miles an Hour."

Brienne blushed. "I have a name, you know." She paused, realizing, "And so do you, but I don't think you ever told me it."

Sansa smiled again. "Sansa. My friends call me San."

"My name's Brienne. My friends call me... uh, Brienne." She smiled stupidly, but Sansa seemed more amused than anything else. "Except Asha. Don't call me anything that Asha calls me. She gets punched half the time for what she calls me."

"I'll keep that in mind."

Sansa got up and went to the fridge in the corner. It was empty, except for two wine coolers. "Want one?" she asked, holding them up. "I think they're peach."

Brienne smiled. "OK."

 

***

 

Asha, Arya and Margaery stood around in the kitchen, looking at the locked basement door.

"How long should we give them?" Arya asked.

Margaery sighed. "Oh, I think a little while longer. I mean, we left them those wine coolers, but they're both idiots, they're going to need a minute to drink them and break the ice."

“You told everyone to ignore their texts, right?” Asha asked them.

“Duh,” Arya answered.

Asha grinned. "I don't want to think about what we're going to have to resort to if this fails."

The movie was nearly over and finally, Asha decided it was time to open the door. She swung it open unceremoniously to find Brienne and Sansa sitting on the steps, Brienne's arm around Sansa's waist, with two drained wine coolers next to them, and a sappy look that said things were going exceedingly well.

"Hey, where'd our star pitcher and that cheerleader go?" she yelled theatrically.

They jumped apart, looking up. Sansa tried to act indignant. "You know, I texted you jerks like forty five minutes ago to come let us out."

Arya shrugged. "Whatever. Movie was loud. Anyway, looks like we did you a favor." She strolled away.

Brienne was Asha's ride home, so they left together a little while later.

"So, dumbass, did you finally get her number?"

Brienne smirked. "Yup."

"Get anything else?"

Brienne tilted her head to the side and tugged the neckline of her Wildcats jersey down a little. Asha saw what looked for all the world like a hickey.

She hooted out the window. "OH! Look at you, Tarth. You got a hickey from Sansa Stark!"

"Shut up."

She started to sing taungtingly as they drove. "You're gonna get some, you're gonna get some-"

"Shut up."

"Brienne and Sansa sitting in a tree-"

"You're such an asshole."

"K-I-S-S-I-N-G-"

"You're asking to get punched."

Brienne's phone buzzed in its caddy on the dashboard. Before she could grab it, Asha seized it. It was a text from Sansa.

It was an excruciatingly pretty selfie, and the message: "Can't wait to let you hold my bag again."

Asha whooped. Brienne blushed. But she didn't even care. She was getting flirty messages from Sansa Stark, and life, at least for the moment, was good.


End file.
